Of Ivory and Arsenic
by Aleia Jade
Summary: A thrilling tale of love and loss.


_For the Fancy Feast to my Friskies, recoilandgrace. Even the Victorians used snuff, you know.  
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><p><em>My Love is like the sun,<br>That in the sky does run,  
>For ever so constant and true; <em>

_But hers is like the moon,  
>That wanders up and down,<br>And every month is new._

_All you that are in love,  
>And connot it remove;<br>I pity the pains you endure;_

_For experience makes me know,  
>That your hearts are full of woe,<br>A woe that no mortal can cure.  
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><p>Loker turned from his sketch pad to the ravishingly handsome woman beside him. "Isn't she just the truest, most lovely and beautiful creature this world has ever known?" he murmured, then added in a low, brooding tone under his breath, "But no one sees the secrets lying dormant within that deeply guarded smile, that disarmingly cheerful facade."<p>

Ria Torres regarded at him levelly from beneath her long, dark lashes, patted his face, and shook her head at the melancholy lad. "I think you've had too much sun today. You're sounding a bit feverish." She stood, adjusting her skirt back to a proper length from whence it had ridden up while she was seated on the grass. "I'm going to get some lemonade. You'd be wise to do the same."

Loker stared forlornly after her. "It's true, though." Then he let his blue gaze roam across the lawn and his fellow picnickers once more, finally sending it back to the laughing couple some yards away. The man had caught one of the woman's golden curls in his hand and was lazily winding it round his finger. The woman was smiling radiantly, and reached up to stroke the gentleman's rough beard. They seemed the very picture of springtime love, all prisms and rainbows, roses and honeysuckles and apple trees bursting into heavily perfuméd bloom.

Yet as he watched, the beaming woman quieted, pulling her arms closely about herself. The man struggled to maintain the mood, running his hand back through her thick mane of cornsilk, but even now the shadow had passed, and she was pulling daisies from the ground with great intensity and plaiting them into a long chain. The man contented himself with employment as her harvester, wandering far and wide to pick her the fullest, brightest, strongest flowers, as her deft fingers wove them together, finally tucking the ends under into a crown. Placing it atop her flaxen hair, she rose from the grass, gracefully dusting a few blades off her skirt as she wandered toward the tables of food. Her companion hung back, watching her for a moment as she slowly circled the desserts table, like a beautiful vulture going in for the kill, if a vulture had perfect posture and a hankering for chocolate. Finally she selected some candied plums, and strolled underneath some stately elms, whereupon she set the cherished delicacies down.

A few furtive glances seemed to assure her that she was unobserved, as Lightman had been suddenly engaged in conversation by a rather earnest gentleman in a beaver hat, and Loker was obscured from her view by a grassy knoll. Reassured by her illusion of secrecy, the girl produced from her bodice a small crystal vial of powder, which she sprinkled liberally over her sweetmeats before quickly and daintily consuming them.

Immediately Loker rose to his feet and began dash hurriedly across the lawn. At the same time, Lightman's efforts to disengage himself from his conversation proved fruitful, and he began to make his way towards the towering elm and his beloved. They arrived at precisely the same moment, just as Gillian slumped to the ground with a strange pallor and sheen of perspiration. "I need a doctor! Call me a doctor!" Cal shouted across the lawn as he reached down to cradle the motionless frame in his arms.

Loker seized the vial and tested a few grains of the abandoned powder. "Arsenic!" he breathed. "She has swallowed arsenic!"

Quickly, the summoned doctor, recently arrived, began to force charcoal down Gillian's throat. Cal found himself praying to a god he'd believed he'd abandoned long ago, so frightened was he at the prospect of losing the angelic life form that lay still and pale before him.

Suddenly she convulsed, bosom heaving and eyes rolling, emptied the contents of her stomach on the ground beside her and then collapsed back into the doctor's waiting arms.

"Gillian, love, why? How could you do this?" Cal implored. "I love you, beyond all thought and reason. Anything, anything, ask me and I shall do it!"

At this the fair woman's eyes brimmed with tears, and her small, perfect hands rose up to cover them, lest a single drop fall to the ground and shame her with the sudden display of feminine weakness. So ashamed was Gillian that she could only choke out a single name: Burns!

Ah! Loker could guess the problem now. The entire citizenry had seen Gillian gallivanting around town on the arm of that scoundrel Burns, and so soon after her courtship with Mr. Foster had broken off, too! Though she was a great favorite of the townsfolk, they had gossiped something terrible about it, particularly after it was discovered that Mr. Burns had been involved with some...rather unsavory business ventures. Gillian had been by all accounts completely innocent in all this, yet still she felt it to be some blemish upon her honor, and an insurmountable one at that, given the events of this afternoon.

"He is nothing, my dear!" Lightman cried out, his eyes blazing with a sudden fury. "I shall have him banished and defamed, and you need not fear his dreadful shadow again. You, my dear, are perfect as a budding rose, letting its colors burst in starlight. His darkness shall not worry you more, love." Every obstacle only convinced him further that this beautiful creature must be his, made him more sure that could he only prove his love, she would realize his attentions and surrender her pride to him, permitting them to be joined in holy matrimony and eternal wedded bliss.

She however, well aware of his intentions, continued to flit and skip among suitors, hoping to shake his ivory tower glasses and see her as a real, flesh-and blood creature, not the fair maiden of his folklore. The more she flirted, however, the more steadfastly he seemed to cling, certain his unyielding loyalty would be rewarded. At last she had despaired, certain both that she was irredeemably shamed in the eyes of the world, and yet elevated still higher on the marble pedestal of his affection. Seeing that not even the height of despair, self-murder, could remove this impenetrable barrier to their happiness, Gillian allowed herself to succumb to the effects of the arsenic still coursing through her veins.

As the life-breath left her, Eli withdrew from the company, giving the two would-be lovers a last, tearful moment together. Their ill-paired attraction, he mused, though so passionately cultivated, was brought to conclusion, though the resolution was far from either's rose-tinted hopes of honeymoons and old age. Ah, foolish love, with such fatal cure!


End file.
